<abstract xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">

At its core, contact tracing is a form of egocentric network analysis (ENA). One of the biggest obstacles for ENA is informant accuracy (i.e., amount of true contacts identified), which is even more prominent for interaction-based network ties because they often represent episodic relational events, rather than enduring relational states. This research examines the effect of informant accuracy on the spread of COVID-19 through an egocentric, agent-based model. Overall when the average person transmits COVID-19 to 1.62 other people (i.e., the <italic>R</italic>0), they must be, on average, 75% accurate with naming their contacts. In higher transmission contexts (i.e., transmitting to at least two other people), the results show that multi-level tracing (i.e., contact tracing the contacts) is the only viable strategy. Finally, sensitivity analysis shows that the effectiveness of contact tracing is negatively impacted by the timing and overall percent of asymptomatic cases. Overall, the results suggest that if contact tracing is to be effective, it must be fast, accurate, and accompanied by other interventions like mask-wearing to drive down the average <italic>R</italic>0.
</abstract>

At its core, contact tracing is a form of egocentric network analysis (ENA). One of the biggest obstacles for ENA is informant accuracy (i.e., amount of true contacts identified), which is even more prominent for interaction-based network ties because they often represent episodic relational events, rather than enduring relational states. This research examines the effect of informant accuracy on the spread of COVID-19 through an egocentric, agent-based model. Overall when the average person transmits COVID-19 to 1.62 other people (i.e., the R0), they must be, on average, 75% accurate with naming their contacts. In higher transmission contexts (i.e., transmitting to at least two other people), the results show that multi-level tracing (i.e., contact tracing the contacts) is the only viable strategy. Finally, sensitivity analysis shows that the effectiveness of contact tracing is negatively impacted by the timing and overall percent of asymptomatic cases. Overall, the results suggest that if contact tracing is to be effective, it must be fast, accurate, and accompanied by other interventions like mask-wearing to drive down the average R0.

The impact of contact tracing on the spread of COVID-19: an egocentric agent-based model

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This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

running-head

At its core, contact tracing is a form of egocentric network analysis (ENA). One of the biggest obstacles for ENA is informant accuracy (i.e., amount of true...

Current model situations
Situation	Average R₀	Context
S1	1.62	Public health intervention like mask-wearing
S2	2.11	R₀ near lower end of best estimations, no public health intervention
S3	2.56	R₀ near higher end of best estimations, no public health intervention
Previous R₀ estimates
R₀	Citation	Context
2.20	Li et al. (2020)	Wuhan; January 22, 2020
2.20	Riou and Althaus (2020)	China and overseas; January 18, 2020
2.24	Zhao et al. (2020)	China; January 10-14, 2020
2.28	Zhang et al. (2020)	Diamond Cruise Ship, February, 2020
2.35	Kucharski et al. (2020a)	Wuhan; January-February, 2020
2.50	Imai et al. (2020)	Wuhan, January 18, 2020
2.55	Majumder and Mandl (2020)	Wuhan, December 8, and January 26, 2020
2.68	Wu et al. (2020)	Wuhan; December 31-January, 28, 2020
2.90	Liu et al. (2020)	China and overseas; January 23, 2020

	Susceptible?	Contact?	Infected?	Symptom?
Susceptible	✓	X	X	X
Non-infected contacts	✓	✓	X	X
Presymptomatic and asymptomatic contacts	X	✓	✓	X
Patients	X	X	✓	✓
Recovered	X	X	X	X

The impact of contact tracing on the spread of COVID-19: an egocentric agent-based model

Publicado en línea: 17 jun 2021

Páginas: 25 - 46

DOI: https://doi.org/10.21307/connections-2021.022

Palabras clave
Egocentric network analysis, Agent-based model, COVID-19, Contagion

© 2021 Andrew Pilny et al., published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

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Three contexts of model testing and selected previous estimations.

Six groups of agents.

The impact of contact tracing on the spread of COVID-19: an egocentric agent-based model

Publicado en línea: 17 jun 2021

Páginas: 25 - 46

DOI: https://doi.org/10.21307/connections-2021.022

Palabras claveEgocentric network analysis, Agent-based model, COVID-19, Contagion

© 2021 Andrew Pilny et al., published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Figure 1:

Figure 2:

Figure 3:

Figure 4:

Figure 5:

Figure 6:

Figure 7:

Figure 8:

Figure 9:

Figure 10:

Three contexts of model testing and selected previous estimations.

Six groups of agents.

Palabras clave
Egocentric network analysis, Agent-based model, COVID-19, Contagion